WiFi And Abandoned Game Bug Updates

Keeping everyone informed. We have reviewed logs of several disconnected/abandoned games. There are two cause categories

  1. Game Disconnects / WiFi Disconnects
  2. Bugs when resyncing game on Reconnect

Thus two types of improvements we are adding.

  1. Staying connected is best.
  2. But also when disconnects happens, we are adding additional redundancies to reconnect and sync the game.

Here are the updates we are currently testing internally

Connection stability:

  1. Improvements on WiFi mesh networks
    FIXED in internal release, testing now

  2. Improvements on WiFi connection maintenance
    FIXES in internal release, testing now. Continuing research here as well. Basically giving highest priority to WiFi channel routines.

  3. Improvements on advanced routers (with excessive disconnects)
    REASERCHING safe adjustments to simplify the connection. We are not streaming high bandwidth video. Most of the advanced router methods just create more load and detriment for a board just sending chess moves. Sounds weird, but dumbing down the connection will benefit us, more stable for a lightweight system. Fixes in the works - but this is something we lack all the equipment to test (we do not have the 100s of routers our customers use). So we will be rolling these out carefully. We have to accommodate all routers of course, so there will be lots of routines and fallback routines.

  4. Improvements to resyncing when move happens during WiFi disconnect
    FIXES in internal release and more fixes on the way. We are adding more redundancies to make sure all is synced when reconnected. We had some corner case bugs.

~~

We get >5,000 games per day now and climbing. So we are able to collect even 1 in 1,000 errors and also prove fixes to those errors.

There are users how have the bugs at a way higher frequency (some users have zero). This is usually related to the WiFi issues. We will get everyone to stable status as soon as possible. We just have to be careful not to roll out “fixes” that are steps backwards for others. So there will be test groups and it will take a few days to release updates carefully.

10 Likes

Thats great to hear :slight_smile: Before i start a match i always check wifi connection. If its bad, i restart my router etc. I played like 20 games for now, and only had disconnect errors in the earlier fw versions.
So far working better with every release :slight_smile:
I am also an IT guy, so i understand your approach and vote for it!

1 Like

OK I confirm the issues, i had many abandoned games (when playing on chess.com). As if my opponent stop playing… until zero second and i get an disconnected message
I’m on Wifi Mesh (devolo)

Still getting abandonments on 1.6.1. WiFi signal reads as full. I only get the “reconnecting” message maybe once every 1 or 2 hours, but every single time it happens my game gets lost. It really doesn’t seem like it should be that hard for the board and chesscom to periodically verify game state and resync as needed. Not sure who’s end this is on, but it’s somewhat ridiculous that the board apparently can’t disconnect for even a handful of seconds without there being a high probability of a lost game.

In addition to losing a bunch of games, I also randomly had a reminder of the play nice policy pop up the last time I logged in. Not sure if that was coincidental or if my account is getting flagged for abandoning so many games.

I’ve only got 3 days to make a decision whether or not to send it back. I made a post about how they should extend the return window, but I can’t find it now. I assume they deleted it. I’d really like to keep this board, but at this point it feels like all promises and no fixes.

It is on our end and it will be fixed. The return window is open until these functions are complete and then +30 days - there is no rush to return.

I agree this should be simple to resync and it will be fixed soon.

2 Likes

I’m holding out playing rated games on chesscom until the issue is complete. Rather not lose more rating points than I already do with my gameplay and trust this will get resolved soon. Hope it does as really enjoy the board play when the games are not interrupted by a bug like this.

2 Likes

Hello,

Just wondering if there’s any update regarding the problem ?

There are several improvements already in place and some more releasing next week.

Also - when we investigated all these lost moves, many logs showed people opening the game on another device, so just want people to be aware - do not log in to Chess.com somewhere else to peek at the game. That can kill the game on the board. This is a property of Chess.com. For example, if you log in on the app with a game open in the browser, it will disconnect the browser. So just beware of that. If you want to peek, do it from another account. However, if you watch the game with an eval bar, that is considered unfair play. So do this the right way.

The remaining fixes are further improvements to WiFi connectivity and some more redundancy on reconnecting lost WiFi and resyncing moves. We have been steadily making progress.

We are also going to bring up a way to observe the game without disconnecting the board - so people who are cautious can watch and get comfortable that the fixes indeed are in place and working well.

2 Likes

Has anyone disconnected yet on a rated game after the latest updates. I’m too scared to try right now.

I haven’t had a disconnected game yet, and I’ve been playing since the beta testing. Seems like a lot of the people having issues are trying to check their game on their phone or computer during the match which disconnects from the board.

1 Like

I had two bot games that where not finished , so i probably think there is still an issue with 2.5.0

I also have had zero abandoned games - I think much of it was people checking their phones. You can play unrated games if you want to check - can take a little longer to find an opponent but not that long.

I only play chess.com bot games and have had exactly one dropped game since 1.6.4, and that was with 1.7.3. Previously, I would have the odd dropped game but the percentage of lost games was dropping drastically with each update. Now zero drops on 2.5.0.
I don’t think my wifi is the more problematic type but have been happy with the steady and noticeable improvement.
Now to get to 3.x.x. so we can analyze bot games :upside_down_face:

Bot games we have some other issues to fix - but improvements coming there soon.

The online player vs player and the bot play are two different mechanisms in the Chess.com interface. Improvements to bot games are coming very soon

3 Likes